VERO LAKE ESTATES, Fla. — We're digging into the case of a 15-year-old girl who was hit and killed while waiting for the school bus.
We originally reported on the incident when it happened April 12.
It's been six months since Haylee Hughes was declared brain dead due to the accident, and still no one has been charged.
WPTV's investigative reporter Kate Hussey spent the past two months digging through records to find out why.
Haylee's mother, Jericho Hughes, told Hussey she feels she's been robbed of justice.
"She was just starting out. She... she was my first born. I was 18 when I had her. We pretty much grew up together," said Jericho Hughes through tears. "I was so excited to see all of the things she was going to do."
On April 12, Florida Highway Patrol said 15-year-old Haylee Hughes was walking to her bus stop on the corner of 79th and 102nd Avenue when a truck swerved into the Sebastian River High Schooler, hitting her and tossing her body onto a grass shoulder.
The teen was flown to St Mary's Medical Center, but doctors determined her brain had gone too long without oxygen and declared her brain dead.
After ten days, Jericho Hughes made the gut-wrenching decision to take her daughter off life support.
"That was... um…. the… that was the hardest thing to have to witness my daughter stop breathing," said Hughes. "From that point on, we knew she wasn't coming home."
FHP said the person who hit Haylee was one of her classmates. A 17-year-old on his way to school.
We aren't identifying him because he's a minor.
According to the Traffic Homicide Investigation report conducted by FHP, the teen not only hit Haylee, but left the scene.
The timeline
The only 911 call made related to the crash came from the teen driver's father.
“911, what’s the address of your emergency?” asked the dispatcher in the call.
“I was just driving by, there’s a young lady by a construction site, she was— I think she was hit by a car," said the father to the dispatcher. "She's not talking, she’s breathing, though, thank god."
FHP said the teen's cell phone records indicate he hit Haylee sometime before 6:23 a.m.
They say he stopped just past the crash.
Investigators said the teen told them he thought he hit a mailbox.
They say he then called his father, and told investigators his father told him to come back home to look at the damage.
Cell phone records indicate at 6:31 a.m., the teen then left for school again.
According to FHP's investigative report, at 6:37 a.m., the driver's father was at the scene, calling 911.
"I do have the ambulance on the way and I have law enforcement en route as well," said the dispatcher.
"She's breathing, a little heavy. Please. Hurry," replied the father.
"You don't see any vehicles around or any…?" the dispatcher asked.
“No, well, I... I... I... I know what happened, I know what happened, I just got a call from my son, he was on his way to school, um, on 79th street, he’s like ‘Dad, I think I hit a mailbox, I don’t understand, I wasn't even in the middle of the road,'" said the father.
"Okay, so your son probably hit a vehicle— or, hit a person?” asked the dispatcher.
“Yeah, that’s what I'm saying!” said the father.
“Okay, okay that’s…that's...well you said you weren’t 100 percent sure, so I wanted to make sure," replied the dispatcher.
“No, no, no, I'm...I'm...I'm 100% sure," said the father.
It's now 6:40 a.m., at least 17 minutes after Haylee was likely hit.
"Where is your son?" asked the dispatcher.
“I — I — he came to my house, and then he... he showed me, where, like he told me about where the mailbox was, and I was like, 'Okay...' and then he's like, 'It’s a plastic one on the side of the road, a white one,'" said the father.
At the time of the accident, Haylee's mom said her daughter was wearing dark clothing. Jeans, converse, and a dark top.
FHP in their report said it was dark at the time of the crash with little to no lighting.
"I see — uh — cars coming now," the father told the dispatcher.
“Okay, do you see lights and sirens coming?” asked the dispatcher.
“Yeah, and like, like I said, I'm looking at the tracks on the road, stuff like that," said the father.
"Uh-huh," replies the dispatcher.
"Nothing that he swerved over the side, it's all…” continues the father in the 911 call. At this point, sirens can be heard arriving on scene.
Records from the Indian River County Sheriff's Office show a trauma helicopter landed on scene at 7:12 a.m., nearly an hour after FHP believes Haylee was hit.
Medical records show at this point, paramedics put Haylee on oxygen.
However, it takes nearly another hour to get her to the hospital and seen by a trauma team. Haylee's medical records show she arrived at 8:08 a.m.
"The damage was too far [gone]," said Hughes.
According to Haylee's hospital paperwork summary, she had no broken bones and no damage to any vital organs except her brain, which was bleeding.
A CT scan shows that bleed turned into what's called an "anoxic brain injury," meaning her brain wasn't getting oxygen.
We wanted to know if the length of time it took to get Haylee to the hospital played a factor in her death, so we sent her records to another neurologist to review.
Brent Masel is the National Medical Director for the Brain Injury Association of America.
"Would getting her treatment earlier potentially have made a difference in her chance of survival?” Hussey asked Masel.
"Yes, the delay undoubtedly made things a whole lot worse," said Masel. "Time is brain."
FHP said the teen driver told investigators he was looking for something in his bag when the crash happened, and investigators in their crash report concluded the teen "operated the motor vehicle in a careless or negligent manner" and "fled the scene."
However, the State Attorney's Office responded to the report writing prosecutors don't plan to file criminal charges because the "facts of the matter don't establish the defendant was aware of the victim's injuries when the defendant left the scene of the accident."
The letter did add if more evidence is discovered, prosecutors would take another look at the case.
For Hughes, though, it all feels so unfair. She's waited too many months for justice, and Haylee waited too many minutes for help.
A daughter's story: cut short. Her grieving mother's: still unwritten.
"How can you grieve with an open ending?" asked Hughes through tears. "She’s still in the ICU in my mind. When I wake up in the morning, I wake up in a panic, thinking that I have to rush back to the hospital, and then I have to remind myself."
Hughes has now set up a small memorial for Haylee, a glimpse of the young girl's life: full of flowers, toys and trinkets.
We called the State Attorney's Office to ask why the case didn't merit reckless driving or hit and run charges.
Prosecutor Bill Long told Hussey he can't comment on the case, but said in general his team is cautious about prosecuting lesser charges as double jeopardy could be a roadblock in pursuing more serious charges down the road.
We also called the teen's family. His father, and the family's attorney, told us they have no comment.
